COVER STORY SIDEBAR

A GOLF SWING THROUGH HUMBOLDT

by Jim Hight

On the first tee at Beau Pre Golf Course in McKinleyville,
16-year-old Kenny Cole bends his knees, grips his Titleist driver
with both hands and points the face of the clubhead at a golf
ball teed an inch off the grass.

Keeping his gaze on the ball, he pulls the driver to his right
and winds it back around his torso until the head pauses near
his left shoulder. Like a spring he uncoils and smacks the ball
with the center of the clubhead. It's launched like a missile
toward the Mad River before gravity brings it to rest two-thirds
of the way down the 367-yard fairway.

"About 230 yards," estimated Bob Spaletta, who sat
at a picnic table behind the tee. "I wish I'd started playing
younger, but with three kids..."

"We didn't have time," said Bob's wife Arlene.

Bob, 63, and Arlene, 58, found golf about six years ago, after
he'd retired and their children were off on their own. It wouldn't
be too much to say that today they live for golf.

"Before I started playing," said Arlene, "I
had a friend who just loved golf. She used to tell me, 'If my
grandchildren want to see me they have to come on up to hole number
nine.'

"At the time I thought that was just horrible. Now I say
that to my own grandkids."

But the Spalettas don't mind mixing kids and golf.

They told me proudly about their 17-year-old grandson Randy
Knight Jr. who has played for Arcata High's golf team. And on
this day they'd come to Beau Pre not to play golf but to coach
children, some as young as 8, who were entering their first tournament.

We ended our conversation as Bob and Arlene wandered over toward
the putting green, where about 35 kids -- including three girls
-- were practicing putts and waiting for the tournament.

Team captains were chosen by another volunteer, then came the
ego-bruising ritual of picking teams: the first chosen celebrated,
the last picked waited quietly for the process of elimination
to reach them.

Arlene and Bob were each assigned a team, and as they walked
off toward the first tee, Beau Pre employee Brent Stone watched
and thought back to his own start in golf.

"My brother took me out to hit some balls at the driving
range," said the athletic looking 19-year-old. "I caught
one solid. What a nice feeling." Since then he's become one
of the top golfers in the county. At the Times-Standard Humboldt
County Amateur Tournament in August, he came in second, four strokes
behind Tim Crowley Jr. (see Cover Story).

Stone, Crowley, Kenny Cole and the troop of youngsters that
hacked and putted their way around the course that day are all
part of a wave of young golfers playing on Humboldt County's seven
golf courses. Tiger Woods' phenomenal success may have inspired
some young newcomers to the game, but junior golf has been a fixture
in Humboldt County for years.

Our home-grown golf prodigy Chris Johnson, a touring pro since
1980, started at age 5. She was determined to keep up with her
older siblings at Baywood Golf and Country Club. "If they
took the clinic, I was taking the clinic. If they were hitting
balls I was hitting balls."

In Humboldt County, dedicated golfers play through the wet
season. But the game's popularity peaks during the dry months,
when morning starting times are usually booked up in advance by
locals and visitors. "We get a lot of players who are staying
here for the summer," said Ryan Choate, a pro-shop staffer
at Beau Pre. "Some of the RV parks sponsor their own mini-tournaments."

Beau Pre owner Don Harling estimates that his business has
doubled in the last 12 years. "There's a lot of new golfers,
a lot of juniors and women. And we're seeing growth among the
baby-boomers. They're getting older and not playing baseball and
other sports so much but getting more into golf."

Nor is weekday golf cheap. A pair of golfers will need $51
to play 18 holes ($17 each) and rent a cart ($17) at Beau Pre.
If they'd rather walk but need to rent a set of clubs ($8), they're
still looking at $42.

People new to the sport can spend as little as $130 for a set
of entry-level clubs at Pro Sport Center. But serious players
spend $500 or more at local pro shops. A titanium driver with
an extra large clubhead can cost up to $500.

But many golfers manage to keep their costs down.

When Bob and Arlene Spaletta first took lessons from Harling,
the couple shared one set of used clubs. "Don (Harling) said,
'Don't invest in good clubs until you're sure you like the game,'"
Bob recalled. He spent $600 last year for a high-quality set that
he expects to last at least 10 years.

By their own count, the Spalettas had played more than 300
rounds of golf between them since the first of the year. That
much golf would have cost well over $5,000 if they hadn't become
Beau Pre members. They paid $75 to join five years ago (now it's
$250) and $800 a year for unlimited golf.

Most golf courses offer "twilight" rates in the late
afternoon. Beau Pre's rates drop at 3 p.m. Benbow Valley Golf
Course charges $8 to play its nine-hole course after 5 p.m. on
weekdays. Eureka Municipal Golf Course discounts its green fees
to $6 for weekday twilight golf. Discounts for youth and seniors
are also common.

Charities like Hospice of Humboldt raise thousands through
tournaments which golfers pay from $50 to $125 to enter. "Some
play because we've serviced someone in their family, some play
because they know someone on the board, and others just do it
for the fun and prizes," said Marge Custis, Hospice president.

For the 8-, 9- and 10-year-olds who played three holes with
the Spalettas and other volunteer coaches, it was a chance just
to learn and enjoy.

"They had cake and soda at the end, but no prizes,"
said Bob. "It was really just the last day of their summer
practice clinic.

"For some of them it was the first time they'd ever played
on the course. Hopefully they'll go back and do it again next
year, and after two or three years they'll get up with the older
kids. The more they play the better they're going to get."